People v. Simmons

434 N.E.2d 435, 105 Ill. App. 3d 402, 61 Ill. Dec. 282, 1982 Ill. App. LEXIS 1674
CourtAppellate Court of Illinois
DecidedMarch 30, 1982
Docket80-2205
StatusPublished
Cited by4 cases

This text of 434 N.E.2d 435 (People v. Simmons) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Appellate Court of Illinois primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
People v. Simmons, 434 N.E.2d 435, 105 Ill. App. 3d 402, 61 Ill. Dec. 282, 1982 Ill. App. LEXIS 1674 (Ill. Ct. App. 1982).

Opinion

JUSTICE HARTMAN

delivered the opinion of the court:

Defendant was found guilty of theft in a jury trial on evidence that he falsely reported to his insurance company the theft from his car of a radio-telephone for which he received $1,400 from the insurance company. He was sentenced to 2 to 6 years imprisonment. He raises as issues whether or not: the indictment was vague and duplicitous; the State adduced evidence outside the bill of particulars; the jury should have been instructed on the lesser included offense of misdemeanor theft; the State’s closing argument was proper; and, there was prosecutorial misconduct before the grand jury. For the reasons which follow, we affirm.

Evidence was adduced at trial of the following events. Before September 1975, defendant purchased a radio-telephone unit and had it installed in his Excalibur automobile. He insured the automobile and radio-telephone unit with Aetna Casualty and Surety Company (Aetna). On September 2, 1975, the day insurance coverage expired, defendant reported to the police that a burglary occurred in his garage, and that the car’s tires, wheels, removable trunk (containing the receiver-transmitter unit), radio and radio-telephone headset were taken. Defendant subsequently reported his loss to Aetna. The total claim came to $7,962.16 of which Aetna paid him $1,400 in February 1976 for the loss of his radiotelephone. In the summer of 1977 the radio-telephone he had reported stolen reappeared in his possession.

Defendant first contends that the court erred in failing to dismiss the indictment, which he alleges was unconstitutionally vague and duplicitous because the “first half” of each count of the four-count indictment alleges the elements of the offense of theft and ostensibly charges him thereof, whereas the “second half” appears to charge him with fraud on an insurance company. We disagree. Duplicity occurs when two or more offenses are charged in the same count, not from charging a single offense in more than one way or where different acts contribute to the same offense. (People v. Ross (1961), 21 Ill. 2d 419, 421, 173 N.E.2d 474; People v. Kent (1974), 18 Ill. App. 3d 357, 309 N.E.2d 715.) Here, the general allegations couched in the language of the statute, followed by a specific description of the purportedly unlawful acts, did not charge separate crimes of theft and fraud on an.insurance company as contended. Rather, the “second half” of each count described the acts contributing to the offense of theft charged in the “first half.” In People v. Sullivan (1961), 21 Ill. 2d 232, 171 N.E.2d 623, cited by defendant, the indictment was vague, indefinite, duplicitous, confusing and incomprehensible. Whether the allegations charged defendant with additional offenses or were related to one single offense could not be determined. No such circumstances exist in the indictment at issue here.

Defendant next claims that the court improperly allowed the State to introduce evidence which went beyond the scope of its original and amended bills of particulars, which stated that the occurrence described in the indictment was a continuing offense beginning on or about September 1975 and culminating in February 1976. Defendant objects to evidence which was introduced of events occurring in 1977 and 1978, e.g., evidence that defendant gave the radio-telephone, which he had reported stolen, to his former employer, who in turn left it in a repair shop. Although defendant’s motion for a bill of particulars is not included in the record on appeal, the trial court at one point commented that it requested information as to when the crime occurred and its location. Thus, defendant apparently did not request the dates of all events of which evidence was to be adduced at trial.

Evidence concerning events which occurred in 1977 and 1978 was properly received because it was introduced to prove that defendant had committed a crime within the period specified in the bills of particulars. A bill of particulars which specifies that an offense took place at a particular time does not preclude the introduction of evidence of events leading up to or after the offense; moreover, even a variance between the date of the crime specified therein and the date as proved at trial need not constitute reversible error, unless the date is an essential ingredient of the crime or relates to the running of the statute of limitations. (See People v. Custer (1972), 11 Ill. App. 3d 249, 296 N.E.2d 753; People v. Simental (1973), 11 Ill. App. 3d 537, 297 N.E.2d 356.) McDonald v. People (1888), 126 Ill. 150, 162, 18 N.E. 817, cited by defendant, is distinguishable from the case at bar since there evidence introduced at trial related to events entirely independent of the offense charged. The surprise claimed by defendant through introduction of the 1977 and 1978 events is unfounded since the State’s answer to discovery revealed that information more than one year before trial.

Defendant next contends the court erred in failing to instruct the jury on the lesser included offense of misdemeanor theft. He argues there was evidence from which the jury could have concluded that the less expensive unit of the radio-telephone, the telephone headset unit, rather than the more expensive transmitter-receiver, was fraudulently reported stolen. He relies upon the fact that only the telephone unit, and not the transmitter-receiver, was admitted into evidence, and that documents in evidence by which the transmitter-receiver was traced through its serial number were proved to have been forged.

An instruction on a lesser included offense should only be given when the evidence permits a finding of not guilty on the greater offense but guilty on the included offense. (People v. Balls (1981), 95 Ill. App. 3d 70, 74-75, 419 N.E.2d 571; People v. Bembroy (1972), 4 Ill. App. 3d 522, 281 N.E.2d 389.) In the present case, most of the evidence adduced related to the theft of the transmitter-receiver; there was insufficient evidence to sustain a conviction of theft of the headset alone. For example, the transmitter-receiver can be traced from defendant’s original possession of it, to his later possession of it after he had reported it stolen, through its serial number, decoder number, and nonstandard crystals. The only evidence adduced relating solely to the headset unit was a label of the unit’s old decoder number found on the headset in defendant’s possession identifying it as the one he had reported stolen, a number which could have been assigned to anyone after defendant relinquished it 3 years earlier. As to defendant’s assertion that documents containing the serial number of the radio-telephone were forged, the evidence shows more probably that they were altered to correct a miswriting and accurately depicted, as altered, the correct serial number.

Defendant claims prejudice in the argument of the prosecutor. Evidence has been presented at trial that during September and October of 1975, after the reported burglary, defendant’s car was inoperable.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
434 N.E.2d 435, 105 Ill. App. 3d 402, 61 Ill. Dec. 282, 1982 Ill. App. LEXIS 1674, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/people-v-simmons-illappct-1982.